- Ethiopian-born award-winning broadcaster and writer gets OBE honour
Nigerian-born British writer, the critically acclaimed Irenosen Okojie, will Wednesday receive the MBE honours for services to literature at Windsor Castle, Buckingham Palace, London.
Among others who will be recognised with royal honours at the event is the award-winning broadcaster and writer Lemn Sissay.
Ms Okojie’s first novel, Butterfly Fish, won the Betty Trask Award in 2016. Her story Grace Jones was awarded the AKO Caine Prize for African Writing in 2020, crediting her win with giving her “extra confidence” as a black, female experimental writer who has felt she was “operating on the fringes.”
The Grace Jones story for which she won the £10,000 prize followed an impersonator of the singer as she mourns the death of her family in a house fire. Judges for the prize called it “a radical story that plays with logic, time and place”, and praised it as “risky, dazzling, imaginative and bold.”
The 54-year-old Sissay, who was the official poet of the 2012 London Olympics, will receive an OBE for services to literature and to charity.
Mr Sissay, whose mother arrived in Britain from Ethiopia pregnant with him in 1966, spent his early life in foster care and children’s homes, an experience which features in his literary work.
Throughout his career, he has seen the publication of nine of his books, the production of seven plays, and four further radio plays.
Among his achievements are an MBE, which he received in 2010, and being elected chancellor of the University of Manchester in 2015.
While in the position, he set up a bursary scheme to boost the number of black law students in 2017.
He also became a member of the board of trustees of the Foundling Museum – which tells the story of the Foundling Hospital, Britain’s first home for children at risk of being abandoned.
In 2019 he was awarded the PEN Pinter Prize for authors who take an “unflinching, unswerving” look at the world.
Mr Sissay has appeared numerous times on television, including in the Southbank Show and BBC shows Grumpy Old Men, Winter Walks, and Have I Got News For You, as well as being a regular contributor to BBC Radio 4’s Saturday Live programme.
Ms Okojie, born in Nigeria but moved to England at age of eight, attended Gresham’s Boarding School in Holt, Norfolk for several years before becoming a pupil at St Angela’s Convent School in East London.
In her early teens, she was a student at Stamford Boarding School for girls in Stamford, Lincolnshire for a brief period then returned to London to finish her secondary education. She studied Communications and Visual Culture at London Metropolitan University.
Along the way, she worked as a freelance writer, marketing assistant and editorial Assistant. She is a freelance Arts Project Manager and curator.
She was the National Development Coordinator at Apples & Snakes, England’s leading performance poetry organisation and a Publicity Officer for The Caine Prize For Fiction tour.
She worked with The Southbank Centre on their live children’s show Peter & the Wolf and has programmed for Duckie for their series of interactive nights.
Irenosen was a selected writer for the Flight mentorship scheme for young writers run by Spread the Word.
Her work has been featured in The New York Times, The Observer, The Guardian, the BBC and the Huffington Post amongst other publications. Her short stories have been published internationally.
She was presented at The London Short Story Festival by Ben Okri as a dynamic writing talent to watch then featured in the Evening Standard Magazine as one of London’s exciting new authors.
Her debut novel, Butterfly Fish, published by Jacaranda Books won a Betty Trask Award. It was shortlisted for the Edinburgh First Book Award. Her short story collection, Speak Gigantular was shortlisted for the Edgehill Short Story Prize, the Jhalak Prize, the Saboteur Awards and nominated for a Shirley Jackson Award. It was selected by film director Carol Morley as an Observer Summer Read.
Irenosen has been a judge for The Society of Authors, The London Short Story Prize, The Royal Society Of Literature, the Berlin Writing Prize, Henley Literary Festival and Mslexia Short Story Competition. She was a judge for the 2020 BBC National Short Story Award and the 2021 Gordon Burn Prize. She is currently a judge for the Women’s Prize 2022 Discoveries development programme, the International Dylan Thomas Prize and The British Book Awards. She has moderated panels for The Testaments tour, the Southbank Centre, Africa Writes, English PEN, Birmingham Literature Festival, Writing on The Wall Festival in conversation with Marlon James and others. She was the first Writer in Resisdence for Words of Colour.
Curatorial projects include Black Joy for the BBC, Maverick Women and The Moon featuring Margaret Atwood and The Moon As Muse film talks and screenings for Moon Festival. Her next two books, Nudibranch and Curandera were signed by Little Brown’s Dialogue Books. Nudibranch was featured in Vanity Fair magazine. It was championed by Margaret Atwood as a wild, recommended read and selected as one of the best books of the year in the Guardian and Observer Review by Bernardine Evaristo and Diana Evans. It was longlisted for the Jhalak Prize. Her story, Synsepalum was recorded by actress Niki Amuka-Bird ( Luther, Avenue 5, Old, The No 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency) for the BBC. Her theatre film piece, Gunk featuring Sarah Niles( Ted Lasso, I May Destroy You, Rocks, Catastrophe) was directed by Akinola Davies Jr ( Sundance winner and Bafta nominated). Irenosen is the winner of the 2020 AKO Caine Prize for her story, Grace Jones. A fellow and Vice Chair of The Royal Society of Literature, she is the co-presenter of the BBC’s Novels That Shaped Our World podcast, Turn Up For The Books alongside Simon Savidge and Bastille frontman, Dan Smith, a follow up to the TV series. She was awarded an MBE For Services to Literature in 2021 for which the honour is being bestowed on Wednesday March 16, 2022.
